Dispatches from the Flying M

Tonight at World Fantasy

Tonight at 8 pm is the big World Fantasy Convention mass signing. Neil Gaiman, Connie Willis, John Connolly, Patrick Rothfuss, Elizabeth Bear, Laura Anne Gilman, Steven Erikson, Peter Beagle, Greg Bear...these are just a few of the many big-name authors who'll be gathered in the same room, signing books and chatting with fans.

Oh, and me, too.

World Fantasy Convention-bound

I'm on the way to San Diego for the World Fantasy Convention. The fun kicks off tonight with the World Fantasy Convention Meet and Greet at Mysterious Galaxy San Diego, then the convention begins on Thursday. It'll be a busy weekend!

Guest Posts, Konrath and Frightfest

It's Halloween, the one time of year when people want to hear from horror writers! I have various blog guest posts coming up, including one on J.A. Konrath's busy, popular blog, and one that's part of a cool Halloween-oriented Frightfest event. Check them out at the links, and join the conversation!

World Fantasy Convention Panel

At next week's World Fantasy Convention, I'm moderating a panel. It's on Thursday night, at 8:00 (yes, it will run into my bedtime--I'll try to stay awake till the end, though. Here's the description:

Pacific 2/3: The Role of Class in Fantasy and Horror

Science fiction often deals with class conflict. How do fantasy and horror pursue the same concepts? Are vampires and elves the bourgeoisie? Are werewolves and orcs the working class? Who are the working class heroes of our genre?

John Hornor Jacobs, Jeff Mariotte (M), Kirstyn McDermott, Kari Sperring, Kathryn Sullivan

Should be an interesting hour.

 

Off to L.A

Mysterious Galaxy Redondo Beach tonight for the Meet & Greet, and Long Beach tomorrow night for the SCIBA Authors Feast!

Occupy Writers

After several days, my name is finally on the OccupyWriters list. The organizers have had an incredible response from the writing community, and it's taking some time to get everybody up.

Here's the entire statement: We, the undersigned writers and all who will join us, support Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy Movement around the world.

Proud to be part of it.

New Review of The Slab

The great, influential, and strangely named Ginger Nuts of Horror blog has posted a new review of my novel The Slab.

One thing I've often said is that I would rather get a bad review from a reviewer who really gets what the book is about than a rave from a reviewer who just doesn't. Every author gets a lot of the latter and a few of the former.

Even better, though, is a rave from someone who gets it. That's what Jim McLeod's review today is. He starts off with: "The Slab is one of those books that transports back to a time when you first started to fall in love the genre.  It reminds of some of the great horror novels of the '80's.  That's not to say the novel feels dated, not by any means. What I'm trying to say, remember those books that had a a roller-coaster fun heart, with a huge cast of characters, that kept you turning each page under the covers long after your parents told you to go to sleep."

From there he goes on to discuss the role that the landscape itself plays in the book, and the meaning of the post 9-11 time frame, and more.

The full review is at the link above. It's greatly appreciated.

The Slab is available in a trade paperback edition, beautifully illustrated by Tommy Lee Edwards, and in an e-book edition for various readers (but without the illustrations).

The Problem with Pundits

When Christiane Amanpour took over ABC's Sunday political talk show This Week, I was hoping that her background in hard news and international affairs would make her different. No such luck. I caught the first few minutes of the show this morning, and all she could talk about, in reference to the Senate obstructing the president's jobs bill, was how it was a setback for the president.

Not a word about how continued lack of government action on jobs (in the face of big business sitting on piles of cash without hiring, and consumers either too broke or afraid of being broke to spend) is a setback, every day, for the country as a whole. We need jobs. Congress might be able to do something to help, but the Republicans are blocking every attempt. And the punditry class can only discuss how this helps or hurts candidates, not the effect on America.

Maybe in addition to occupying Wall Street, we need to occupy the media.

Jupiter

Be sure to check out Jupiter this month (with a telescope if you have one). It's been hanging around with the moon the last few nights, and it's closest to Earth on 10/27. It won't be this close again until 2022, so enjoy it while you can!

Republican Candidates in Fantasyland

The presidential election is still more than a year away, but as of last week's Republican debate on the subject of economics, every candidate in the field has disqualified him or her-self for the job. In 2008, John McCain did that to himself when, faced with the sudden, staggering financial freefall (the depths of which even the experts underestimated, which is part of the reason every response so far has been inadequate), his reaction was to suggest that we should freeze government spending. That would have guaranteed that the situation would have been far worse than it was, and it was plenty bad enough.

Like McCain, this year's contenders are not dealing with the world that we actually live in. If any of them was seriously a legitimate candidate for the office, he or she would stand up to the Republicans in Congress and tell them that the nation's fiscal health is more important than political advantage, and they should stop obstructing every effort to cope with the terrible unemployment situation that is the biggest drag on the country at the moment. They would stop pretending that deficits are the problem (which they only forget when they're endorsing yet more tax cuts for the wealthy) and they would remember that the economy needs a strong middle class to prosper.

But they're doing none of those things. Since the biggest roadblock facing the US is unemployment, and they all refuse to honestly address the issue, much less allow any substantive progress to be made, electing any of them would be a national disaster.

Some key reading on these points: Paul Krugman (you might have to sign up for the NYT online) on Rabbit-Hole Economics.

Robert Reich on The Seven Biggest Economic Lies.

Kevin Drum on six economic myths (okay, one fewer than Reich, but more graphs so it's a wash).

Bizarrely, the only Republican candidate to say anything halfway sensible about the economy this week was Michelle Bachmann. Only I'm pretty sure she didn't know what she was saying. Her suggestion: "I want to reinstitute the Reagan tax model from the 1980s.”

Of course, most progressives these days are only pushing for returning to the Clinton-era tax structure (when the economy did really well), and not the higher rates of the Reagan era. But if Bachmann can convince her party to go along with an across-the-board tax hike, it might be worth trying.